TomTom GO 730 4.3-Inch Widescreen Bluetooth Portable GPS Navigator

We bought the Tomtom 730 unit about 1 week ago and really like it. We were Garmin fans but chose to give the Tomtom a try after my brother swore up and down about how well it worked. We have owned and used Magellan and Garmin GPS units.
Likes:
Voices are excellent
Routing is execellent
Ability to reroute around 1 road is awesome
Tomtom support is very helpful. They speak english and seem to be located within the US.
Much better software than other GPS providers.
Most accessories for the 720/920 work for the 730 including the Traffic antenna

Dislikes:
Screen washes out in sunlight – We will have to look for a sunshade
Mounting system – What were they thinking? It fell off the window twice and doesn’t even clip into the mount. Had to buy a 3rd party mounting system (Ram mounts work)
Should come with some type of case to protect the unit.
Really wish the speeding and red light cameras were supported in the US
POI doesn’t seem to be as robust as a Garmin. Tomtoms have millions of POI but just not the stuff we normally look for such as grocery stores, etc.

We nearly took the unit back because the screen washes out in sunlight without some type of sunshade. We took the 730 and compared it directly with the Garmin 770. The garmin seemed to find more points of interest around us and everything was much simpler to see in direct sunlight. We finally chose to keep the Tomtom because it calculated the routes much quicker and allowed us to reroute around a single road, the garmin doesn’t give you any control and reroutes the whole route which was the deal breaker for us. My wife also noted that the Garmins felt very unrefined after she had experienced a Tomtom. The Tomtom 730 is a fantastic device but plot on spending at least 50 dollars more to buy better accessories such as mounts, sunshades and cases.

9/30/08 5 months later
I still have a few gripes regarding this unit. The battery life is dreadful. When turned off, the unit will keep a charge for 4 days before it needs to be recharged by the computer adapter. The car charger does not charge the unit but instead supplements battery power. In the case of low battery, the unit will run really off the car adapter but will not charge. I have called Tomtom two times regarding this issue and was told this behavior was normal for these types of electronics. REALLY? A co-worker has a Garmin that can go a couple of weeks turned off before it complains about a low battery.
Another complaint I have is the screen, it just wasn’t made for the Arizona sun. It washes out and becomes nigh impossible to read during the day. Sunshades help reduce the issue but it is still an issue.

I am tired of spending money on accessories just to bring the unit up to what it should have been. If I could redo this buy, I would get a Garmin. I know they aren’t perfect either, but the Tomtom just isn’t pulling its weight for the price paid.

Overall, I really like the 730. But, I finished up returning mine to Circuit City and biting the 15% restock fee because of a few serious flaws (see cons section).

Pros:

- Extremely quick interface response. You tap a button on the screen, and it switches screens instantly.
- Very quick routing. A 15 mile trip with many streets takes about 1 second to calculate the fastest route using IQ Routes mode.
- High quality; both the over-all feel of it and visually.
- MapShare. MapShare is fantastic and I use it all the time. If a road was recently renamed, closed, the speed limit changed, etc, I could instantly right the map while driving and share the changes with other TomTom users.
- Tons of features! Hands-free calling through Bluetooth cell phones, FM transmitter, MapShare, IQ Routes, iPod control, etc.

Cons:

- My main complaint and the reason I returned the 730 was because it would freeze while in hibernate mode about once a week. It never froze when “on”, only when it was “off” (which is really hibernate/sleep mode). The power button would do nothing to turn it back on. I had to use a paper clip to hit the hard-reset button to start it back up. Maybe I just had a lemon unit. If not, hopefully a software update will fix it in the future.
- The second reason I couldn’t keep the 730 was because it was hard to see the screen on sunny days. The screen could be a small brighter, but I reckon the main problem was the screen itself. I would see a reflection of myself on the screen during the day, even when the unit was on.
- The computer software (TomTom Home) that connects the TomTom to your Mac or PC is horrible. It crashes all the time, is slow, has a weird interface, and is pretty limited. You cannot plot routes on your PC in a real app and load it into your TomTom. You have to use the “Control my TomTom” feature to do this, but that is just seeing the TomTom’s small screen on your PC and using the normal TomTom controls.
- FM transmitter is weak. While I’ve never seen a excellent FM transmitter, TomTom messed it up with a firmware update. It was a lot stronger in the same place all the time, and with the firmware upgrade, it made the signal weaker.
- Hands-free control of the TomTom is useless to me because you have to interact with the TomTom with your fingers just to start it, and even while speaking commands to it.
- Last, but not least: when upgrading the maps on the 730, you loose all your MapShare corrections. For some reason, TomTom keeps specific MapShare corrections tied directly to the specific version of the map. This doesn’t make sense to me, and seems to defeat the purpose a small.

Conclusion:

A fantastic product that has a lot of potential. If your unit doesn’t freeze and you don’t mind seeing your reflection in the screen, I would recommend the TomTom 730.